Turn up the noise

Highly entertained tonight by the GOP debate tonight,  followed by The Daily Show, which gave me some perspective.

I learned a lot tonight:

• Michelle Bachman has had more foster kids than were in my elementary school class
• She also thinks that submission is equal to respect
• A pizza delivery man wants to lead my country
• You can preach equality while still refusing to pass a bill legalizing gay marriage on the federal level
• Iowans deep fry butter.

Furthermore,

        Mitt Romney believes that the "ideal place to raise a child is in a home with a mom and a dad." However, our very successful current president was raised by his mother and grandmother. In fact, the idea of a traditional family is rapidly changing these days...there is no such thing as a cookie-cutter family in this country.

        When Santorum stated [on abortion], "To be victimized twice would be a horrible thing. We should surround these women and help them," I agreed. We should support women who cannot support their children. I'd like to see Santorum himself going around and handing out blankets, diapers and food to every pregnant woman across this nation who cannot raise her baby, and could not get an abortion. Once I see him do that, I'll begin to consider his candidacy and validity.

        I could go on and on about the ridiculousness of politics,

but I'd rather not.

        I'm going to read some more of my Joshua Foer book, and get some sleep.

But before I do that, I'm going to watch the Colbert Report...

And you should get your dose of Steven Colbert too:  click here!

Memorize This

I'm reading Moonwalking with Einstein- The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer right now, and am completely mind blown.  He discusses memory as a dying art. The current chapter I'm in describes how far we've fallen since the golden ages of the Greek. Back then, they memorized scrolls. They internalized words, and learned them. Today, we skim. We read billboards and text messages. Some of us read a book in a week, or a day. When we move this quickly, we fail to absorb the content of what we lay our eyes on.

Foer described one guy who literally compiled an entire electronic database of his life. He recorded every conversation, scanned every sticky-note, thank you letter and tax return into his hard drive so that he would have every moment easily accessible. While I think this is a bit excessive, (OK, absolutely mental) I agree that we need to take more in. Life moves too quickly. They say we forget moments at about the same rate we relive new ones. I refuse to accept that as truth. We need to adapt as a society, think before we speak, and act in ways we want others to remember. (And then make an honest effort to remember more of what we do, read, hear and experience.)

While I don't want to store every moment of my life, or  be able to remember as well as some of the characters Foer meets and describes, I do want to be better at the art. After all, the world's greatest books and documents, ancient literature, were written at a time when reading was completely different. When "reading" meant "internalizing," not taking in words on a page for the sake of brief entertainment. Memory gives meaning.

More about Moonwalking with Einstein and Joshua Foer

• Rated one of the best books of the year on Amazon
• Foer appeared on The Colbert Report back in March
• Review appeared in the New York Times
• Appeared on 99% website

Go out and read it!!

Stephen Colbert Super PAC

http://www.colbertsuperpac.com

 

        I love Stephen Colbert for making such a loud point about pacs, money and politics. He's proving that money talks, loudly. But that's all it does, talks.

        I went online and wrote in 106 characters or less what I stand for (and you should too!) I think words and conversations beat out silence, but immediate action beats out words. We need to spend less time arguing over the debt crisis, and more time making actual changes. Only by doing can we get things done. Now, this philosophy may appear naive. Surely we can't just jump into action whenever we feel like it, otherwise we may find ourselves treading water in the middle of a decade long war that's taking more than it's giving. Surely laws need to exist to prevent bold decisions- But what about the not so bold decisions? People can't talk about anything except the debt crisis these days-- So why not make a radical change in policy and see what happens? Nothing can be worse than what we're facing right now, so why not take action?